Blok Pod here we come…

It’s been a crazy few days since leaving north Devon. The weather when we left was already challenging physically and mentally as there was no let up. Basically it has been appalling and it’s probably been the first point we’ve felt low, it’s surprising how much the weather affects you.

That said, yesterday was a new day and we woke up to sunshine. It was warm enough to sit here with the side of the van open and have breakfast whilst soaking up some much needed vitamin D, we were feeling good again 🙌🏻. Today was an exciting day because it meant we were heading to Blok Pod to have the garage in Han fitted with some slide out trays to organise our gear for future trips.

They say that the journey is more important than the destination, or ‘the doing’ is more important than ‘the outcome’. Well this was a journey that started about 5 months ago, off the back of a conversation with Dan from Vanworx. We were talking about how to organise the garage in the van and he mentioned he’d seen a post on Instagram and sent me a link. I shortly after followed up with an email and started talking to Dan Lindfield from Blok Pod.

I sent him the back of a fag packet drawing that made the inside of the Tardis look small! It was a wish list more than a carefully dimensioned space, but Dan saw through that pretty quickly once he started looking at the dimensions! The challenge was how to fit in all the different kit we wanted to take with us, depending on the season and the activity. This wasn’t a double garage! Now literally only a month ago, after a lot of emails and drawings, we finally agreed on a layout and Dan could complete the design and work with his colleague Dave to start building the trays.

Yesterday we arrived at Blok Pod late morning and finally got to meet in person Dan and Dave. I was like a kid in a sweet shop, but unfortunately, in my rush to get inside and see the trays, I got talking to Dan and forgot to tell TA to come inside 🤦🏻‍♂️. I think I was forgiven….not sure?! I might’ve got this wrong but Dan is the designer / boss and Dave is the engineer / builder, and probably keeps Dan in check 😉. What you probably don’t know is that these guys have built stuff for films, like James Bond’s film Spectre, Thunderbirds and also appeared on The Gadget Show a few times too. But what is absolutely clear from the moment we stepped into Blok Pod, they were the dream team!

We got a tour of the facility and what they engineer / craft / manufacture and the quality of the final product is nothing short of amazing. Having had the tour, we were super excited to go and see the trays, we weren’t disappointed. Both Dan and Dave had the trays built but what they didn’t have access to was the bikes and since bike dimensions and geometry are all very different, the solution to hold the bikes to the tray would be dealt with whilst we were on site.

Both Dan and Dave worked tirelessly to fabricate the solutions there and then, taking parts that they had made previously on site and fine tuning or making new parts in their machining room. They kept talking to us during every aspect of the installation, making sure we were happy with the various options. For them the easy piece was getting the trays in the van and bolting them to the floor. The not so easy piece was figuring how to bolt the bikes to the trays because of the limited height in the garage. If we had engaged Blok Pod from the start of the van build we could’ve avoided some of the workarounds. But they had the know how to come up with a solution. The service and the attention to detail, skill, expertise and quality just filled us with confidence. To give you an idea of how hard these guys worked to make sure we were happy, we didn’t leave the facility until 9pm that night, we were there over nine hours.

The end result is that we now have an incredible solution in the garage, we just now need to better organise the kit that we ‘stuffed’ into the van before we came away! We will be back in a few weeks to pick up the snowboard tray and a second tier on the main tray that they are building for us, which will also help with organising our surfboards too.

Thanks Dan and Dave, really appreciate the effort and love the solution 🤩

Tubbs & TA 🙏🏼❤️

Check them out; 🌍 www.blokpod.co.uk

The before and the after….

Slowly repacking the van….we need to re-prioritise our kit. Rookie error….took too much stuff with us #justneedtheessentials

The workshop and our trays! These guys are good….quality is 👌🏼